A friend was in the toilet, scrolling on his phone, when a message pops up very fast: ‘You have violated the rules of our community’. Panic! He suddenly calls me. He lives in a small village, he wasn’t doing something too bad in the toilet. “…I was born here, for 25 years I never deceived them, not even when the Nigerian prince offered me 10 million or the Siberian blond girl wanted to marry me. Which rules? Old Tom hasn’t said anything and Father John baptized me. Every Wednesday evening I play futsal with the same friends, same team even if they always put me in goal. On weekends I help at the soup kitchen or help elders with home repairs. I always take care of my community!”
He took a moment to breathe and I finally had time to speak. “Mike! They banned you!”
He suddenly answered: “Banned me?! My community? Where will I go now?”
Me: “That’s from some social network. “
Mike: “Do you mean that site where I have friends I never met and they write ‘good morning’ every day? Or where I can watch videos of people doing stupid stunts we weren’t allowed to do as kids, or people permanently on holiday, or the rope trick? Maybe the group of students posting their poo at school. Or maybe somebody got offended because I didn’t answer his good morning, so they decided I was ill-mannered and banned me. Or maybe when I started following a girl, but I wasn’t really following her, she reported me for stalking. Or maybe when I liked how someone made a cake, my aunt found out. Or the one star on that ugly cat. “
Me: “Yes, Mike, that’s what we call a social network. We need to follow the rules to keep it safe.”
Mike: “Phew! I’m glad! But what community needs to be safe, if nobody knows each other?”
Me: “The community exists. They tell stories of users who reach the highest number of friends, collect the exact number of likes, a pinch of stars and a bunch of followers, and cast the spell. Only these are allowed to enter the community, a place where bits grow freely on silicon trees and rivers of bytes flow from one group to another. There you can find the supreme admin, who from his throne created bots to ban those who don’t deserve a place in our community.”
Mike: “I’ll appeal to Father John, he’s the best on divine matters.”
Me: “Don’t! There is a form, bots only read it and always return the same answer: ‘You have violated the rules of our community’”
This article is released under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0). You may share, translate, adapt and reproduce it freely, including for commercial purposes, with attribution to Raffaele Mangialardi and a link to https://www.mangialardi.it/you-have-violated-the-rules-of-our-community